Karl Popper gave a lecture under this title, in Zurich, in 1958. He begins by saying that when he thinks about the history of the expression the West, he wonders if he shouldn't avoid it, since it became commonplace following the work of Oswald Spengler. The decadence of the West, an author whom Popper considers the false prophet of a non-existent decadence, as well as proof that what his false prophecy really shows is the intellectual decadence of many Western thinkers, who hide their lack of intellectual modesty with bombastic words .
Having said this, he asks himself: what do we Westerners currently believe? What does the West believe in? “If we seriously approached this question – he answers – most of us would admit that we don't really know what we believe in”, and he adds: “We should be proud of not having one idea, but many ideas, good and bad; and that we do not have a single belief, nor a single religion, but many beliefs and religions: some good and others bad. That the West can afford this plurality is proof of its supreme strength. The agreement of the West on a single idea and a single belief would be the end of the West, our capitulation, our unconditional surrender to totalitarianism.
In the West there have always been and there are many false prophets and false gods: there are people who believe in power and in subduing others. Others who believe in an inexorable law of history that allows us to foresee the future with certainty. There are enthusiastic prophets of progress and others complaining of reaction. There are also those who only believe in success and efficiency, in economic growth at any price and in man's power over nature.
And, finally, there are those who have the most influence among us today: the prophets of pessimism, who agree that we live in a miserable age, positively criminal, possibly the worst of times. Which provokes a double response from Popper: 1) he Says that “the well-intentioned enthusiasts who want and feel the need to unify the West under the leadership of an inspiring idea do not know what they are doing. They are not aware of the fact that they are playing with fire, that what they are attracted to is the totalitarian idea. 2) He considers the pessimistic conception of our time erroneous, based on the conviction that "in the West, almost all of us would be willing to make any sacrifice to ensure peace on Earth, if only we could see the usefulness of this sacrifice for that end”.
At this point, Popper asks himself again: what does the West believe? His answer is descriptive: we Westerners hate despotism, repression and force; We are against war and against any form of blackmail, and especially against blackmail due to the threat of war. We believe in freedom and that only freedom makes life dignified. And although we sometimes doubt whether or not it is right to buy peace at the price of freedom, we know that it was never possible to defend freedom without taking risks.
In short, the West believes in personal freedom to think and to self-regulate one's life and interests, and recognizes that each person is the unique and unrepeatable subject of their own history, which begins and ends with them. Western culture is, therefore, an anthropocentric culture that, according to Paul Valéry, is based on Greek philosophy, Roman law and Christian theology, and, according to Xavier Zubiri, on Greek metaphysics, Roman law and the religion of Israel.
The end result has been good. Popper affirms that, "despite everything, our time is the best of which we have historical knowledge and that the type of society in which we live in the West is, despite its failures, the best that has existed to date." Because of this, and looking at the monument to the Unknown Soldier as a symbol of Western beliefs, Popper also sees it as a symbol of "our faith in the unknown common man."
